By Tollbar students compete across the globe on world maths day
Students at Tollbar Academy have been hard at work practising for this year’s 15th anniversary of World Maths Day.
Year 7 and 8 students will join children around the world today (Wednesday, March 23) to compete against each other in what has become one of the world’s largest maths events.
The event aims to get primary and secondary school students excited and enthusiastic about learning maths and encourage friendships between children of different cultures as they improve their maths skills together.
The first-ever World Maths Day, created in 2007, saw almost 300,000 students from 98 different countries take part in online games based on mental maths problems. Today, millions of students from 240 countries will take part.
During World Maths Day, students are asked to compete against each other in a range of one-minute online games. The games are designed to test the mental maths abilities of students in different age groups, with 10 levels to choose from. There are prizes and awards for students who do well.
Students at Tollbar Academy have been practising to take part in World Maths Day on Mathletics.com by competing online against the computer, against their classmates, and other children in schools in the UK and around the world.
David Sidebottom, Assistant Curriculum Leader for Maths at the Academy, said speed and accuracy are essential, but it is also about making maths fun and appealing to students.
“Students can create their own login profile and can play against young people all over the world. At this minute we have children from Japan and India online with us. Players can see live scores as they compete and that brings an element of excitement to the games,” he said.
“Maths Day is a really fantastic way of encouraging students to improve their maths skills. They get two practise sessions on consecutive weeks before the event and those lunchtimes have been packed with students giving up their own time to practise.”
Year 8 students, Nuala Stephenson and Maja Bruce, were among those practising during their lunchtime.
“It is really good fun and we are looking forward to Maths Day and being able to compete,” said Nuala.
Year 7 student Macheda Cariss said he too was looking forward to competing on Maths Day, especially with children in other countries.
“You have to be fast and really concentrate and you can see their scores as you go. It is really fun,” he said.
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